


Death, At the End of the World

by mutationalfalsetto



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Pre-Civil War (Marvel), Pre-Serum Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-13
Updated: 2016-05-13
Packaged: 2018-06-08 02:27:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6835276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mutationalfalsetto/pseuds/mutationalfalsetto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In another life, the journey to the finish line is a slow, steady jog.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death, At the End of the World

**Author's Note:**

> rated M just to be safe. special thanks to [bazzystar](http://archiveofourown.org/users/bazzystar/pseuds/bazzystar) for making me cry at literally the worst times.

They meet, poised at a starting line that neither of them can see. Reluctant runners in a mad dash to a finish line that looms much too close for anything other than an all-out sprint.

He looks at him, fists raised, weight shifting foot to foot. In another life he is a boxer, dancing triumphantly in the ring, too fast to see. In another life his chest heaves not with the effort of sustaining just enough breath to live but with the exertion of his sport. In another life, he doesn’t feel the cold of winter settle into his bones even in the August heat. 

“I can do this all day,” he says.

“Had ‘im on the ropes,” he says.

It’s a well-loved script that they return to in these moments, not enough time to write something new.

“Sure, pal,” he says. “Just thought I’d help a little, s’all.” Slings an arm around his shoulders. A swift, soft brush of his lips against his temple as he pulls him close. In another life he is a student, studying physics just to understand what keeps an object moving long after it should have stopped. In another life, he watches the man in the ring with barely contained glee. In another life, he doesn’t wake up before the sun rises, doesn’t return home after night drapes herself over the city.

In another life there is waking up to slow, purposeful touches. There are lips that drag along collarbones, across knuckles, fingers dipping below waistbands because they have all morning. All afternoon. In another life their movements are lazy, barely disturbing the atmosphere around them.

“Don’t stay home for me,” he says, voice barely distinguishable from the sounds of the city below.

“I had pneumonia before,” he says, like that’s going to stop the hands that flutter around his face, the voice that’s just on the wrong side of calm.

“C’mon, Buck,” he says, breathing in through what sounds like—feels like—an ocean’s worth of water. “Can’t have both of us bein’ lazy bums.” 

In another life there are meaningful glances just as there are intertwining fingers and lips that just barely contain the sounds of another. There is mingling sweat and a name that grows steadily louder, repeated with reverence. There are leisurely kisses and moments of quiet reflection after. 

The pneumonia passes. 

The seasons pass in a rush, dry lips pressing hurriedly against foreheads, against palms. They slip by in fumbling hands, in overdue rent payments and “it’s fine, Stevie, I just gotta work a little late.” Time marked in the growth of dark circles under his eyes, the nails bitten to the quick. The harsh grate of a match, the glowing end of countless cigarettes falling from a fire escape like grains of sand falling through an hourglass.

In another life he doesn’t enlist because it’s better to do it when he has a choice (he tells himself, waiting for his name to be called). If his hands shake when he gets his file—the bright 1A sucking the rest of the color from the world the more he looks at it—the doctor examining him doesn’t say anything. In another life, he doesn’t spend the rest of his time in Brooklyn waiting for the other shoe to drop. Doesn’t spend the rest of his time in Brooklyn with guilt sitting heavy in his stomach. 

“C’mon, Buck,” it’s grunted into his neck, the words accompanied by scraping teeth just on the right side of painful. “ _C’mon_.”

When he moves it’s fast, frantic.

In another life he doesn’t feel like the world is spinning off its axis every time he closes his eyes. In another life their meeting isn’t accompanied by the harsh _crack_ of the starting pistol, isn’t characterized by an all-out sprint to a finish line that leads them--

“Don’t do anything stupid ‘til I get back.” In another life he doesn’t leave like this.

“How can I? You’re taking all the stupid with you.”

He pulls him close, breathes in like he’s going to remember the smell when he’s ankle deep in mud and shit with bullets flying overhead. “You’re a punk.”

In another life he doesn’t leave like this. Doesn’t press a kiss to the top of Steve's head like he’s leaving for the docks instead of going off to war. In another life, he doesn’t walk away.

In another life he’s not running for all he’s worth, chest heaving, clock counting steadily down.

He looks at him, raised fists and all.

“Let’s hear it for Captain America,” he says, gives himself a moment in the noise of the crowd. Grieves the absence of sharp elbows that dug into his sides, the knobs of his spine. The harsh lines that are hidden beneath layers of muscle.

“ _C’mon_ ,” he snarls, sinks his teeth into a shoulder that shouldn’t have nearly this much mass. Rakes his fingers down his back because he’s there, because he can. “ _C’mon_.”

In another life, the journey to the finish line is a slow, steady jog. 

In another life, he reads his books in an apartment just messy enough to be home. In another life there are mismatched mugs in a kitchen cabinet, chips taken out of the rims from handling them a little too rough. In another life he wraps his arms around a narrow waist, buries his face in soft, blond hair. Takes a deep breath without the fear of losing the scent in fields overseas. In another life he doesn’t mourn the boy in the alley.

“Remember when I made you ride the Cyclone on Coney Island?” He’s standing on the edge of the world, lungs burning, arms pumping for a finish line that leads them right back where they started.

Air whipping past his face, the impact of his boots on the roof of the train. 

“I had ‘im on the ropes.”

Fists raised, a boxer in the ring. In another life—

Black spots dancing at the edge of his vision, he pushes for those final meters because he’s _right there_ he’s coming up around the final bend. 

Cold metal beneath his hands until it’s gone. 

In another life, time is not a sprint to the finish, a ruthless loop taking them from the moment the pistol fires to the collapse of their legs beneath them. In another life, there is more than the promise of “ _later, later_ ”.

In another life he has decades to map, to memorize. To know him in all his iterations, by touch and by sight.

He does not have decades.

But he knows him.


End file.
